The Brooke has signed up ActionAid's international head of media and images Sarah Gillam as head of comms, and made two other hires.

Melanie Hook joins as comms resources manager from the Royal College of Surgeons, while Victoria Hassett joins as comms officer (media) from Sam Forest PR.

The three appointments have been made to help the charity increase the number of horses it helps around the world, to two million a year by 2016.

Gillam, who previously worked as press manager at Farm-Africa, said: 'We will be looking at how we can maximise our visibility. I will be putting together a comms strategy by next March. We will need to raise money to meet the two million figure and raising awareness is part of that drive.'

The hires come as part of a move to integrate the comms and online teams. Previously, the online team was included in the fundraising unit.

The charity is aiming to launch a new website next year, while it continues its 'responsible tourism' campaign, which promotes better treatment of animals that are used in the tourism industry.

The Brooke currently helps 800,000 animals a year, while benefiting more than 400 million people who rely on these animals for their livelihoods throughout the developing world.